It wasn’t pretty, but the Benton Lady Panthers came away with a 46-40 victory over the McClellan Lady Lions on senior night at Benton Arena Friday in the final regular-season game of the year. Senior Italei Gray led the way with 17 points and three assists for the Lady Panthers, which have won 6 of their last 8 games to improve to 13-12, 7-5 going into Saturday’s 6A West Conference Tournament first-round matchup with Lake Hamilton.
“We were undisciplined quite a bit at times, but we made the plays when we had to,” Benton Coach Jerry Chumley said. “There may have been two or three games all year where we were clicking on all cylinders. I don’t know what causes that, but that’s the way we’re built right now.”
It was a back-and-forth game early as the usually turnover-prone Lady Lions didn’t turn it over once in the first quarter the Lady Panthers led 14-12 after junior Kati Morrow’s 3-pointer assisted by senior Anna Davis came with just under 30 seconds to go.
“The press didn’t work early,” Chumley said. “We were giving up the sideline drives, but the second quarter we did much better.”
Gray began the second quarter with a 3-pointer and junior Makenzy Davidson hit a 10-foot jumper assisted by Davis at the 4-minute mark of the second quarter to put the Lady Panthers up 19-14.
The No. 4 seed Lady Panthers will host the No. 5 seed Lake Hamilton Lady Wolves Saturday at noon at Benton Arena.